MUTING WITH COVID

November 5th.
Did this year fly by for you like it did for me?
After reading the first blog post talking about the pandemic and OMG we are still at it!

Yes, but this time I come to tell you about the mutation that RENNÉ had.

With the pandemic came a thousand and one changes, one of those were the closures of factories and workshops.

At first I was calm since I had a stock of timeless shoes that I could sell while everything passed, obviously I never thought that Covid would last until today.

From the south I kept taking photos at home, posting on social media and putting a lot of heart into each shoe that went to its future owner.

Months passed and the sizes were sold out, along with that the pressures began; “There is no one in my size” “When will you make new models?” “When do you replenish stock?”

After giving the same answer many times: “the workshop is closed, I hope to be able to make more stock soon”
I said ok, this is not going to stop, I have to get to work.

There is a community that is interested in Renné, yes obviously they want to see shoes but in the circumstances we are in perhaps it is a tremendous opportunity to give it a spin and add something more to the brand, I thought about this over and over again with my pillow.

Bye, what does it matter, what can I do?
I'm in Temuco, let's say that there are not enough suppliers here but if I had to do something, I was going to do it!!

Step #1: What do I have going for me? La Rous, my beautiful mother, has always made clothes and since I was little I remember her immersed in fabrics, dressmakers and designs.
Well, she has a unique and unmatched dressmaker here in the south, so extra point!

Step #2: What do I want to do? or frankly what can I do?

I started researching the market, what do people need today? How could I contribute from my side?

Clearly we are in a pandemic and like never before we are all at home wearing sweatshirts!
Ready, here goes the thing.

Step No. 3: Suppliers, believe me, this step with quarantine does not go hand in hand, but in short, work with what there is.

Since everything aligns when you're doing things right, I managed to find a cotton supplier that was just what I was looking for.

Step #4: Ok, I'm going to make sweatshirts, but I don't want them to be the typical sweatshirts that are being sold, I want them to be unique, to have a differentiating message. Classic sweatshirts, but with a perfect fit.
Oversize a few units per model without repeating them, that's the fun.

Prints! Here we return to step #3… suppliers.

For what I'm going to tell you now I need to put you in context:

I live on a plot of land in Temuco where it is: my grandparents' house, that of my uncles and my family.

My uncle has a copper crafts workshop where they make all kinds of designs: notebooks, magnets, paintings and whatever you can think of with copper illustration, I take my hat off!

You will understand that the pandemic also hit them hard, like everyone else!

Well, we were at a family lunch and I started telling about my new sweatshirt project. That's when Juanito, my uncle, told me that we should try printing them with silkscreen in his workshop. He has a machine which we can try to see if our invention works, ok... let's go with everything.

That's where you realize that the paths are beginning to open for something and the decisions you have begun to make are the correct ones.

Having it next to my house, it had never occurred to me!

Well and so we leave.

Buying fabrics, taking them to my star dressmaker so she could give me the cuts, then designing the print together and then starting to print.

I like to tell you the process because I want you to see all the love behind it, I didn't want to buy ready-made sweatshirts and print them, I wanted to do everything from scratch to continue with my great motto "made by hand and with love"

Sweaters ready and we go to step 5.

Step nº5: Photos, RRSS, website and packaging.

The photo sessions were always with dry models or my friends who always managed to do a shooting, but being alone in my house I was the only option left.

I looked for a couple of ideas to do a photo session alone without having to bother anyone.
(Use a mirror and a wheelbarrow to hold it haha)

Ready, it's time to launch a new CAPSULE collection, where the production would be a few models that would not be repeated again.

It was the week of September 18, according to me a terrible date to launch but I didn't have any more time.

9:00 p.m. everything ready to announce the great project.

21:01 the first one was sold!!! I screamed euphorically from my room.

21:02 the second one was sold! and so….!!!

I swear I couldn't believe it, I'm not used to the website being full of people shopping or that the stock I had made for more than a month was gone in less than 24 hours!

I screamed and ran around my house with a satisfaction so great that I don't know how to convey it through these lines.

If you bought a hoodie from the collection, you don't know how happy you made me!!

And that's how RENNÉ began to mutate, I stopped questioning myself so much, I opened my mind and began to think bigger and trust more in myself and my intuition.

At the moment my intention is to make many capsule or “drop” collections, which means making small, limited and exclusive collections.

I wanted to tell you how the brand has changed in case this is your case and you find yourself stuck either with your brand or with a project you are putting together.

My advice is: take a look and trust yourself, there are times when we have a defined plan and well-defined goals but I think that 2020 has made it more than clear to us that everything changes and those who do not adapt become extinct.

I take this 2020 as a new opportunity to reinvent myself, learn and continue fighting.

Let's go for those dreams that are there to fulfill.

A huge kiss and thank you if you made it this far, I'm a little intense and I swear I'll do my best to limit this post! ha ha

Take care of yourself and obviously... let's go with everything ⚡️

RENNÉ